The iColor® 500 printers feature LED technology and low temperature fusing. This allows for the transfer of images onto delicate synthetics without damage to the fabric when used with the iColor® premium transfer paper.

The iColor 500 uses a unique CMYK+Fluorescent White toner set that gives you the full, rich color of a CMYK printer plus the ability to decorate dark garments with vivid, colorful appliques and opaque whites. This unique five toner set solves problems found in other laser transfer products, and does it for hundreds less than any other white toner printer on the market.

iColor TransferRIP is an add-on application that converts the iColor 500 into a four color single pass printer using a CMY-FW cartridge set. Unlike other laser printers, the iColor 500 and TransferRIP solution allows you to arrange the cartridges in different positions. This enables white toner printing for heat transfer and for standard print applications like flyers and transparencies. For more information please click on the 'Q & A' tab.

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There are lots of advantages to using the iColor TransferRIP upgrade. Here are the top seven:

• Color Mapping. As noted above, the Color Mapping tool allows you print Fluorescent White over CMY to support dark garment decoration, or print CMY over Fluorescent White for prints that don’t need to be heat applied. Boutique style flyers on black or colored card stock are a breeze. Just replace the Black toner cartridge with white, keep the standard toner positions and run your prints. This preserves the iCOLOR 500’s full range of print and heat transfer applications.

• Simpler Printing: Using TransferRIP simplifies white toner printing by eliminating the possibility the CMYK and White layers may not align perfectly. Single pass printing removes this worry and produces perfect alignment of white and color for professional quality transfers every time. This makes the print process faster and easier.

• Simpler Design: Two-pass printing requires careful preparation of the art. It’s not complicated but requires a few essential steps. TransferRIP simplifies things by adding the white layer for you. So you don’t need to create it in your design application. You don’t have to determine how much smaller the white layer should be in order to achieve correct CMYK-to-white registration. Just create your image with a transparent background. TransferRIP adds the white layer for you. This benefit alone can save you hours in design time.

• More Graphic Design Possibilities. FlexiSIGN and Vinyl Express LXi don’t work well with two-pass printing. Printing directly from either application causes a noticeable shift on the second pass when the white layer is printed over the CMYK layer. Using TransferRIP eliminates that problem. You can design your image in LXi Master Plus or any version of FlexiSIGN or FlexiDESIGNER. When printed from TransferRIP, you’ll have a perfectly registered CMYW print ready for the heat press.

• White Layer Opacity & Choke Control. The 4th Step in the TransferRIP work flow is the spot channel control. The RIP’s default spot color setting is designed to save money by adding White only where it’s needed to support bright colors in the design. But TransferRIP also allows you to increase the white layer opacity up to 400% for super opaque white and vivid color (FIG2). It also includes a choke tool for shrinking the white layer for optimal image quality.

• Color management tools. Select and replace colors, control saturation, and increase or reduce color by channel. The color management tools allow you to optimize customer-supplied artwork upstream of the printer.

• Softer Transfers & Lower Toner Costs. The final step includes a Screen option that converts the image from solid layers of toner to halftones. There are presets engineered for use with light and dark apparel. Each includes several options for dot sizes patterns, highlights and shadows. The use of the halftone features makes the final transfer softer by placing toner only where it’s needed. This feature adds gives the applied transfer a softer hand and reduces toner cost by up to 40%.